Using Free plans only but listings set to incomplete

Hello,

I am using 5.1.2 and the user reported to me that new listings they were adding weren’t showing up in alphabetical order. So, I could see that newer listings (probably those added after either a WP update or a plugin update, also we upgraded to PHP7.1 recently) were being marked “Incomplete,” and this made them show up at the very end of the directory. In the settings I have payment modes turned off, Free plan is set to be the Default, and sort is set to Title.

This fixes it:
If I open the listing in edit mode, under Listing Information I can change the plan and set it to FREE LISTING, even though it says it is a free listing, click OK and then click UPDATE.

PLAN DETAILS
Fee Plan
Free Listing Change plan
Amount

Then the listing is changed to COMPLETE, and shows up in normal alphabetical order.

So, I tested this with a new listing and I discovered that if you create a listing and just publish without touching the Fee Plan, you get this notice:
“This listing doesn’t have a fee plan assigned. This is required in order to determine the features available to this listing, as well as handling renewals.”

This is a new issue, because we never had to take that step before and our directory has always only had one fee plan (free).

Is there any way we can get this fixed to accept the free plan as default again and just save it as free? It’s going to be confusing to our admin assistant to have to tell her to choose a fee plan when it’s free. Or just hide all payment info to avoid confusion if we have payment disabled?

Here is troubleshooting info-
BD version 5.1.2
BD database revision (current) 18.2
BD database revision (installed) 18.2
Premium Modules
Table check OK
Main Page 23988 (publish)

WordPress version 4.9.1
OS
PHP version 7.1.11-1+ubuntu16.04.1+deb.sury.org+1
MySQL version 5.6.32-1+deb.sury.org~precise+0.1 ( NO_ENGINE_SUBSTITUTION )
cURL version 7.47.0
cURL SSL library OpenSSL/1.0.2g

listings-order-by title
fee-order Array ( [method] => label [order] => asc )

Thanks!